Michael Drejka found guilty of manslaughter in parking lot shooting that led to 'Stand Your Ground' trial

by John Couwels, Ray Sanchez and Eric Levenson

Michael Drejka, who fatally shot an unarmed man, Markeis McGlockton, last summer in Florida during a dispute over a handicapped-accessible parking spot, was found guilty of manslaughter Friday night.

The judge set the sentencing date for October 10 2019.

Drejka faces up to 30 years in prison.

Drejka, who didn't take the witness stand, tried unsuccessfully to use Florida's "stand your ground' law as a defense for justifiable homicide.

The case renewed a nationwide debate on the controversial law.

Jury deliberations lasted about six hours, with a brief pause around 9:30 p.m. when jurors sought clarification on the instructions for deciding guilt or innocence.

The judge sent the jury back to the deliberations room after rereading the instructions to them, and about a half hour later the jury announced it had a decision.

McGlockton's family wept at the verdict.

Drejka at first had no reaction but then started wiping his face as the judge spoke to the jury.

Defense attorneys rested their case earlier in the day after two expert witnesses testified about the defendant's state of mind and his actions at the time of the controversial shooting.

The court later instructed jurors on the law before closing arguments in which prosecutors portayed Drejka as an armed vigilante and defense attorneys described him as a victim who feared for his life.

Prosecutor Fred Schaub quietly told McGlockton's family before the closings,

"I bet you never thought this day would come."

In closing for the state, Scott Rosenwasser urged jurors to ask themselves whether the defendant was justified in shooting an unarmed man who was, he said, trying to protect his family and retreating when he was killed.

He called the shooting intentional, saying Drejka faced no imminent bodily harm or death and that he took "the most perfect shot he could take."

Rosenwasser said the case was "cut and dry," the killing of a man who came out to protect his girlfriend from a self-proclaimed "parking lot vigilante" with a "pet peeve" about enforcing handicap parking rules.

Rosenwasser reminded jurors that Drejka admitted to police that he would have no reason to shoot if the victim was retreating.

"The defendant himself tells you it's manslaughter," the prosecutor said.

"You know what Markeis McGlockton is guilty of? He is guilty of loving and trying to protect his family and he died because of it."

The families of McGlockton and his girlfriend were not in the courtroom for the defense team's closing, delivered by John Trevena.

He said his client was thrown to the ground and would have been "beaten to a pulp" had he not firmly stood his ground to a younger and larger aggressor.

"The right to stay alive is the most fundamental right," he said.

Drejka was not the vigilante portrayed by the prosecution but a man who believed himself to be in mortal danger, Trevena said.

"Mr. Drejka thought the danger was real," he argued.

"This large man pushed him to the ground. The threat was real."

Had Drejka not pulled his weapon, he could have died, the defense attorney said.

"He had the right to stand his ground and no duty to retreat," Trevena told the jury.

The case amounted to more than a parking spot dispute, he said.

It centered on his client -- the "true victim"-- making "a split-second decision" after being violently thrust to the ground.

"The game changed when the gun was pulled. ...Then the game was over," he said.

Thursday, video of the defendant's police interview, including Drejka's reenactment of the July 19, 2018, shooting in Clearwater, was played in court.

His attorney has maintained the killing was in self-defense after Drejka was threatened and then shoved to the ground.

After he shot McGlockton, Drejka told police that he fired only after the man pushed him down and ran at him.

But surveillance video shows McGlockton taking several steps back in the moments before the fatal shot -- a point on which police have challenged Drejka.

"What happens if I told you that I looked at the video and at no time and point does he come running up toward you? He actually takes a step back," Det. Richard Redman asks Drejka the day of the shooting.

"I would disagree," Drejka responded.

The prosecution rested its case Thursday after two days of testimony.

The incident began when Drejka confronted and began yelling at McGlockton's girlfriend, Britany Jacobs, who was parked with two of her children in a handicapped-accessible spot outside a Circle A food store.

As their argument escalated, McGlockton came from the store and shoved Drejka to the ground.

Drejka then pulled out his gun and fired at McGlockton, who had taken several steps back, the surveillance video shows.

In opening statements, defense attorney Bryant Camareno argued that Drejka's comments to police were simply his best recollection and showed his perception at the time.

"He wasn't lying; he was remembering the best that he could from the impact that he sustained," Camareno said.

Minor league baseball player's wife, baby, mother-in-law killed at their home

by ABC News

A minor league baseball player's wife, baby and mother-in-law were killed at their Virginia home, allegedly by another family member, authorities said.

Matthew Bernard, 18, was arrested on Tuesday afternoon on three counts of first-degree murder after he allegedly killed his mother, sister and baby nephew that morning at the family's home in Keeling, an unincorporated area near Virginia's southern border with North Carolina.

A firearm was used in the crime and a 911 caller reported a shooting, but cause of death has not been confirmed, police said.

The victims were the mother-in-law, wife and child of Blake Bivens, a Double-A pitcher in the Tampa Bay Rays organization, Pittsylvania County Sheriff Mike Taylor said Wednesday.

A motive is not clear, Taylor said.

The Tampa Bay Rays said in a statement:

"Blake Bivens, a pitcher with our Double-A affiliate, the Montgomery Biscuits, suffered a terrible family tragedy in southern Virginia. Our hearts are broken for Blake. We are grieving with him and will support him any way we can."

The Biscuits CEO and Managing Owner Lou DiBella said in a statement,

"The Biscuits thoughts and prayers are with Blake and all those who have been impacted by this tragedy."

After the victims were discovered Tuesday morning, authorities launched a manhunt for Bernard, who was said to be armed and dangerous.

Danville Community College in Danville, Virginia, was under lockdown Tuesday as a "precautionary" measure after Bernard, who was a student there, was identified as the suspect, according to the Danville Police Department.

Pittsylvania County Public Schools also went on modified lockdown.

Superintendent Mark Jones told ABC News all outside doors were locked and monitored, all classroom doors were locked and no students were allowed in hallways without a chaperone.

ABC affiliate WSET of Lynchburg, Virginia, was in a media staging area at the scene in Keeling Tuesday afternoon when suddenly Bernard, who wasn't wearing any clothes, ran out from a nearby wooded area and attacked a church groundskeeper then fled again.

"I saw a male, tall skinny male, with no clothes on running around," a woman told local reporters.

"He took off running."

Authorities chased Bernard down the street and were able to apprehend the teen, who was taken to a local hospital for treatment, according to WSET.

It's not clear why he was found without clothes, the sheriff said Wednesday.

A Kentucky high school principal who made national news for trying to ban books over “homosexual conduct” has been arrested on child pornography charges.

Phillip Todd Wilson was arrested Tuesday on 30 counts after state troopers received a complaint from Clark County Area Technology Center that the principal had given child pornography to someone else, reported WKYT-TV.

The principal was charged with 15 counts of distribution of matter portraying sexual performance by a minor, and 15 counts of possessing matter portraying sexual performance by a minor after investigators found more than a dozen images in his possession.

The technology center is operated by the Kentucky Department of Education, which is investigating to determine whether children in the program were affected.

Wilson gained national notoriety in 2009 when he banned “Lessons From A Dead Girl,” a book by award-winning author Jo Knowles, and several other publications from classrooms at Montgomery County High School.

Some parents had complained that several contemporary novels taught alongside English literature classics, such as “The Canterbury Tales” and “Beowulf,” were inappropriate due to subject matter involving sex, child abuse, suicide and drug abuse.

Wilson and Montgomery County School Superintendent Daniel Freeman ordered the challenged books to be withdrawn from the curriculum, and pressured teacher Risha Mullins after she continued using them as optional titles for classroom reading circles.

“One more problem with books and the club is gone,” the superintendent said, according to Mullins.

But Wilson and Freeman eventually shut down the reading club and removed the contemporary books, without following board policy on suspending titles from classroom use.

Wilson remains held on $25,000 cash bond, and Clark County Public Schools released a statement saying officials were “shocked and dismayed” by the allegations.

Two white men charged in child rape and pornography case involving three children

by Sarah Brookbank and Cameron Knight

After police arrested and charged a Lockland man who police said confessed to raping a 5-year-old boy and photographing the child for "sexual gratification," another police department announced there was another arrest in connection to the case.

A 54-year-old man St. Louis man has been arrested in connection with the death of a teenager who is among at least a dozen children 16 or younger killed by gun violence since April, police said Friday.

The suspect, Joseph Renick, faces charges of first-degree murder, armed criminal action and unlawful possession of a firearm for the fatal shooting of 15-year-old Sentonio Cox on Sunday, according to the St. Louis Circuit Attorney's Office.

Police said officers responding to a missing person call arrived in the Carondelet neighborhood last weekend to find Sentonio dead from a gunshot.

Renick was being held on a $500,000 bond, according to the circuit attorney's office.

A teenager who identified himself as a friend of victim told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that Sentonio was headed home when he was shot.

To get home, the teen often cut through an empty lot near the site of the shooting, the friend told the newspaper.

Sentonio's body was found less than 48 hours after another child, 8-year-old Jurnee Thompson, was shot and killed outside a preseason high school football game.

Renick's is the second arrest in the string of shootings.

Police said a suspect was in custody in connection with the death of 7-year-old Xavier Usanga.

The boy was fatally shot earlier this month while he and his sisters played in the backyard of their home in the city's Hyde Park neighborhood.

The suspect has yet to be charged, authorities said.

Federal prosecutors said a St. Louis man facing an unrelated federal charge admitted to shooting Xavier.

He has not been charged in Xavier's death, CNN affiliate KTVI reported this month.

Sentonio's fatal shooting was the latest in what has been a deadly summer for young people in St. Louis, where police are investigating at least 10 of the juvenile shootings as homicides, while two others have been classified as suspicious, according to spokeswoman Evita Caldwell.

People carried balloons at a Tuesday vigil at the lot where Sentonio was killed.

His mother tried to encourage the teenagers mourning him.

"Do what you need to do to survive," said Roxzyanna Edwards, according to CNN affiliate KPLR.

"You can die at any time. Don't take your precious time for granted."

Local reports indicated a 10-year-old girl was among the victims in a triple homicide over the weekend, but it wasn't immediately clear if she was shot or stabbed.

The St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department did not include her in a list of young gunshot victims.

Frustrated residents gathered for another vigil on Wednesday to remember the lives of the city's young children killed in recent months.

The names of the dead flashed across an electronic screen.

A local lawmaker read them out loud.

The killings have led to tearful vigils around the city for the innocent victims of gun violence.

"We all feel the hurt and the pain every day of the week," said James Clark of the community outreach organization Better Family Life.

The youngest victim is 2-year-old Kayden Johnson, who was killed in late April along with his 18-year-old mother, Trina'ty Riley, police said.

Last weekend, city officials announced a grim formula for calculating rewards leading to the children's killers:

A Kentucky pastor who was arrested this year after he allegedly sought sex with a minor via text messages has been indicted by a grand jury, according to court records.

A grand jury in Floyd County, Kentucky, indicted Bobby J. Blackburn, 26, on Wednesday on two counts of prohibited use of an electronic communication system to procure a minor to commit a sex offense, court records show.

Blackburn is the pastor of Elevate Church in Prestonsburg, which is not affiliated with an Elevate Church on Shelbyville Road nor one in Frankfort, and also manages a pizza restaurant in the Eastern Kentucky city.

Both minors were employees of a business that Blackburn manages, according to the arrest citation, which did not name the business or ages of the two minors.

Blackburn's attorney, Stephen Owens, told the Courier Journal on Thursday the females that Blackburn allegedly sought sex with are 17 years old but "media coverage is making it out to be like they are 9- or 10-year-olds."

"They were 17 years old, and in Kentucky, the age of consent is 16,"

Owens said, adding he will file a motion on the "constitutionality" of the statute that is being used to prosecute Blackburn.

While Kentucky's age of consent is 16, the age of consent is raised to 18 if the someone is in a position of trust or authority over the teenager.

According to an arrest citation, Blackburn was arrested in May after a girl showed a Prestonsburg police sergeant images of an iMessage conversation.

In the messages, Blackburn asked the girl to engage in a "threesome" with him and another female minor, among other sexually explicit requests, according to police.

On May 25, Blackburn allegedly followed a third girl to the Prestonsburg Police Department, where the girl tried to give a statement saying she sent the obscene messages from Blackburn's phone.

But when police questioned the girl further, she took back her statement and said that Blackburn told her to say it or else she would lose her job, according to the arrest citation.

Officers attempted to collect Blackburn's phone through a search warrant, but family members said the phone was thrown in a Pike County river, according to police.

Blackburn eventually turned himself in to police on May 29.

He pleaded not guilty to the charge and was later released on home incarceration after posting $5,000 bond, according to court records.

On Wednesday, the Floyd County grand jury indicted Blackburn on an additional count of prohibited use of an electronic communication system to procure a minor to commit a sex offense.

The indictment alleges one of the incidents took place between January 2016 and September 2017, while the second incident occurred in May, According to WYMT,Additional details on the first incident were not included.

Blackburn is being held in the Floyd County Jail without bond, according to jail records.

Also:

Kentucky principal charged with child porn-related offenses, police sayOwens said he also is filing a motion requesting a judge set a new bond amount for Blackburn.

"No bond is like he murdered someone," Owens said.

Blackburn's next court date has not yet been scheduled, according to online records.